HISTORY

Gotye - Somebody That I Used To Know J Awards Video Nomination

Director: Natasha Pincus

About

Natasha Pincus directed, produced and edited the now-famous body-paint video for Gotye's first single, which has currently racked up almost 16 million views on YouTube. But, as Natasha explains, it was tight teamwork, mad talent, and a truckload of hard work that made this exceptional clip.

Q and A

The music video has been viewed almost 16 million times on YouTube since July, and has now become 'THAT Gotye video'... Did you ever expect it to get this big?

Not in my wildest dreams. And it still kinda freaks me out when I think about it. Whenever you make a video, you work unbelievably hard to create what you feel is the most truthful visual expression you can imagine for the song, no matter what the timeline and budget. Sometimes that can result in 20 people seeing the finished clip, or 20 million - you can never predict that outcome, nor have a clue what caused it. That being said, this song is a ripper. Even when I first listened to an early version I had an inkling that it would spread far and wide. And then when Kimbra came on board the magic sparkled even brighter. The whole process just felt like a perfect storm.

How did you go from concept to finished video?

This was a deceptively difficult project to realise. It saw the coming together of various artists who are at the top of their respective fields - a body painter and a scenic artist combining their work with a cinematographer's capturing of live action and stop motion animation. In the first, it was important that I carefully 'cast' the heroes who would loan their geniuses to the project. I discovered Emma Hack's bodypainting work and associated camouflage photography and found it to be breaktaking, so I hunted her down. She ended up coming over to Melbourne from Adelaide for the project. Howard Clark is a stellar scenic artist who had previously painted a 30ft mural across two planes for a Sarah Blasko video of ours in the past, and so he was my first choice to adapt Frank De Backer's beautiful painting from A4 size up to a huge wall mural, and in such a way that Emma could then blend its colours and linework in her bodypainting work the following day. Weeks earlier, Wally and I experimented with manipulating Frank's painting in different ways, testing how to achieve the best effect of the paintwork visually, and positioning its colours in the way that would reflect the emotions of the two characters. Wally proved to be a whizz with Photoshop - he mocked up various versions of the artwork's position using photos of him (playing both roles!) as a guide. Then it was up to Warwick Field (first class Cinematographer) and myself to labour through a month's work pre-planning every shot and every still frame, devising where and how the stop motion elements should be realised in order to time sympathetically with the song's musical progression. The prep was very detailed mathematically, scientifically - it was really important to me to ensure everything was completely worked out before the shoot so that on the days of filming I could be totally available to work creatively with Wally and Kimbra on their performances. We rehearsed before the shoot, going through acting exercises, filming tests etc. We reduced the lyrics down to 'lines' and played out the scene as dialogue between the two characters. We also developed and rehearsed the precise choreography ('that' shoulder roll!) and ensured every word of the lyrics was invested with meaning. The shoot itself was incredibly arduous. We spent one day and night setting up equipment. Then another day with Wally doing his 'nude' performance, painting the background mural and capturing all associated stop motion. On the third day we filmed both Wally and Kimbra's performances and the body paint's application – which was a 26-hour day, straight. It was necessarily such a long process because it took 6-8 hours to paint each person with stop motion being shot during the process. Then, once all painting was finally done, we had a lot of performance still to shoot (obviously the clip was all filmed out of order). And of course I wanted to capture a guzillion versions of every part of the song to give me the most options possible in the edit. It was important to me to shoot several versions of the delivery of each line, so I could have the freedom to 'craft' Wally's character and his arc in different ways later on, and balance and rebalance the evolution of the story. For example, we shot approx 50 versions of Wally's 'somebody' plea at the end, rifling through every emotion possible. Wally and Kimbra's performances were so wonderful, I was spoiled for choice in the edit.

Filming with full-body paint can be quite dangerous – was that your biggest worry on-set?

Is it really dangerous? I didn't know that. Emma had said that models often faint during the process (fatigued by standing still for so long) so we were certainly watching out for that possibility. My biggest concern on set was keeping Wally and Kimbra as alert and as comfortable as possible through all associated aches and pains. Lots of music was played, stories were told, massages were given. It was a marathon endurance test for all of us. I have to admit to feeling pretty average for quite a long time after the shoot. The process took a big toll on all of our bodies.

You directed, produced and edited this video – is it hard wearing three hats at the same time?

It can be, though those three hats are pretty fun to wear. It's the other ones that can make the process unnecessarily tricky. I had two wonderful helpers on the shoot – Rose and Rob - who assisted with everything from catering to general production and lugging gear. But because of the small budgets that music videos often have, you don't have the resources to have regular crew numbers on a film shoot who would otherwise take on specific roles and so take some pressure off you – such as a first AD, camera assistants etc. As a result, you end up spending a lot of energy and brainpower on stuff you really don't want to be thinking about when there are other important things you need to be doing. I do love editing my own work though. This cut took me a few weeks to get right, working day and night. Having the luxury to work to your own rhythms is a real gift, and definitely has a massively positive impact on the final product.